The passage opened up behind the desk; it wasn't hard to picture the wall sliding back and an assassin emerging directly behind the new Quizmaster. "Should I have it sealed up?"

"We'll sow gas capsules under the flooring, the length of the passage, and forget about it. The assassin will be dead before he reaches here."

Shaeffer shrugged.

Cartwright managed to ask: "Is there anything else I ought to know at this point?"

"You ought to hear Moore. He's a top-flight biochemist, a genius. He controls the Chemie research labs; this is the first time he's been here for years. We've been trying to scan something on his work but, frankly, the information is too technical for us."

One of the Corpsmen, a dapper man with moustache and thinning hair, spoke up: "It would be interesting to know how much of that stuff Moore formulates in technical jargon just to throw us off."

"This is Peter Wakeman," Shaeffer said.

Cartwright and Wakeman shook hands. The Corpsman's fingers were dainty, fragile, diffident fingers. It was hard to believe that this was the man who headed the Corps. who had swung it away from Verrick at the critical moment.

The guard showed equal interest in the tall old man.

"How does one become a Prestonite? Preston was an astronomer who got the observatories to watch for his planet—right? They found nothing. Preston went out after it and died in his ship. Yes, I once thumbed through Flame Disc. The man who owned it was a crackpot. I tried to analyse him; a chaotic jumble of passions."

"How do I analyse?" Cartwright asked tightly.

There was absolute silence. The guards were all at work on him; he forced his attention on the elaborate television set and ignored them.